Yemeni political parties pledge to grant some autonomy to the south

Document pledging a 'just solution' in the face of secessionist demands hailed as breakthrough in long-stalled national dialogue between political parties and the government.

SANAA // Yemeni political parties have signed a document pledging a “just solution” that would grant some autonomy to the south in the face of secessionist demands.

The text, signed on Monday, was hailed as a breakthrough in a long-stalled national dialogue between political parties and the government aimed at drafting a new constitution and preparing for elections in February.

However, three leading Yemeni parties have rejected the proposal, which aims to turn the country into a federation of semi-autonomous regions. Hardliners of the country’s Southern Movement also boycotted the session.

The three parties rejecting the proposal were the former South Yemen’s Socialist Party, the former president Ali Abdullah Saleh’s General People’s Congress and the southern Nasserist party, said Abdullah Noman, a member of a committee responsible for drafting the plan.

Mr Noman said the proposal had not fixed the number of provinces into which the new federation is to be divided – a key stumbling block in the national dialogue.

Mr Hadi and northern delegates had suggested a federal state should comprise several entities while southerners have demanded a federal state made up of a north and south only.

The Saba state news agency said the Yemeni president, Abdrabu Mansur Hadi, would chair a panel to decide that issue.

A source from the presidency in Sanaa said the committee will present its final decision on the number of regions on Thursday.

Yemen’s national dialogue, which had been due to close on September 18, is part of a transition backed by the United Nations and the Arab Gulf states which saw Mr Saleh step down after 33 years in power following massive Arab Spring-inspired protests in the region’s poorest country.

Mr Hadi, who took over after Mr Saleh agreed to step down in 2012, attended the signing ceremony on Monday alongside the UN envoy to Yemen, Jamal Benomar, and delegates from key parties.

Following the end of British colonial rule in 1967, Southern Yemen was independent until union with the north in 1990.

Four years later, a secession attempt sparked a brief but bloody civil war, with northern forces retaking the south. Since then, southerners have complained of being marginalised by the government in Sanaa.

The document signed on Monday recognises that unification caused “injustice” in the south and offers a mechanism to compensate southerners whose property was confiscated.

Mr Benomar hailed the agreement as a “quantum leap in resolving the southern question”.

“This is a historic moment” and the new federal state which will be created in Yemen will mark a “complete break with a history of conflicts, oppression, power abuse and mismanagement of resources,” he said.

“With this agreement, we approach the end of the national dialogue.”

However, the situation remained tense in the south, where five people were killed on Tuesday when government forces dispersed a pro-secession protest in Ataq, capital of Shabwa province.

Three soldiers and two armed protesters were killed in the incident, Southern Movement members and a police source said.

Violence has intensified in South Yemen amid tribal anger over the killing of a local chief and his bodyguards at a checkpoint earlier this month.

On Monday, two Yemeni policemen and a civilian were killed in a gunfight in the southern city of Daleh, security sources and witnesses said.

The clash erupted when southern secessionists attempted to storm the governorate building to hoist a flag of the former South Yemen.

Four policemen, four armed men and seven civilians were wounded.

* Agence France-Presse & Reuters